1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a device for guiding vertically movable sheet pile carriers, particularly in deliveries of a sheet processing machine.
The published German Patent Document DE 40 29 919 C1 relates to a device for stacking sheets. Heretofore known are devices for stacking sheets, such as paper or cardboard, especially, on a pallet, those devices having a liftable and lowerable deposition platform on which the pallet rests during stacking, and an auxiliary stacking platform, which can be moved into the region of the deposition platform, for temporarily storing the sheets during a change of pallet. In the embodiment of the device disclosed in the aforementioned published German Patent Document DE 40 29 919 C1, the height of the pallet is determined by a vertically movable scanner element that can be placed on the surface of the pallet and moved over the entire surface thereof. To that end, during the movement of the scanning element over the pallet surface, the maximum upward deflection is measured. The thus-determined pallet height ensures the transfer without difficulty of a temporary sheet pile from the auxiliary stacking platform onto a new pallet.
The auxiliary stacking platform, which can be lowered into stands or pedestals on the entry side, is supported in carriagelike elements, while the deposition platform is movable by being suspended from chains. The deposition platform is held in a freely suspended manner on the chain elements.
The published German Patent Document DE 39 22 803 A1 relates to an automatic sheet pile loading device for a sheet feeder device. The embodiment disclosed therein relates to an automatically operating sheet pile loading device for a paper sheet feeder device having a main lifting device for receiving thereon a sheet pile to be transported. The main lifting device is moved upwardly in stages in order to bring the uppermost sheet of the pile to a predetermined height position with respect to a sheet separator, which is disposed above the sheet pile and takes the sheets individually from the pile. When the sheet pile has been used up, for the most part, horizontally disposed parallel skewers are inserted beneath the stack from both transverse sides of the pile in order to lift the pile load and to lower the main lifting apparatus to accommodate a new sheet pile. The insertion of the skewers in a transverse direction of the pile is advantageous inasmuch as the middle portion of the sheets in the pile can be kept at a constant height in the transport direction of the sheets, regardless of the downward sagging of the skewers, thus making it unnecessary to adjust the position of the sheet separator.
In the version disclosed in the last-mentioned published German patent document, the auxiliary lifting apparatuses are secured to chainlike lifting components and are introduced from the side.
The published German Patent Document DE 43 44 361 A1 relates to a device for forming individual sheet piles. In a device suitable for non-stop operation of, for example, a delivery of a sheet-fed rotary printing press, in which sheets of a sheet stream are combined into individual piles, the piles, respectively, rest on a pile support having a pile bearing surface which is interrupted by grooves. Auxiliary sheet piles are carried by grid bars combined into a rake until the auxiliary sheet piles are transferred to the pile support. To avoid impairments of the pile due to the weight thereof, a catch plate is provided, in accordance with the invention, which catches, from below, the auxiliary pile deposited on the grid bars which are located in a catching position.
As can be learned from the last-mentioned German Patent Document DE 43 44 361 A1, both the pile support and the frame for the rake are suspended from chains. In such pile supports carried in a freely suspended manner in chains, and especially in auxiliary pile supports, factors such as thrusts or shocks or the like exerted from outside can negatively impact the insertion of the auxiliary pile support and the insertion path to be traversed thereby, so that, at the least, the pile changing operation may be accompanied by imprecision.